Fishing
by Weetzie06
Summary: Victor Van Dort is in for mud, dead pets, and potenial friendship when his father takes him to the origins of the family business.


"Come on now, Victor, me lad!" Mr. Van Dort wheezed as he tried to pry his son from his wife. Victor, who was twelve years old and still deathly afraid of the dark, gave his mother one last fleeting look of terror before his father successfully removed the boy from her.

"Good luck, boys!" Mrs. Van Dort trilled and waved her fan, but not too closely as Victor made a grab for it, and she promptly disappeared from view as Victor was placed in the fishy carriage. Bumping and rattling along the cobblestone, the sounds of Mayhew's coughing reached Victor's ears as his father rummaged through a tackle box.

"Victor?"

"Yes, father?"

"I'm going to take you to the origins of our business!" he smiled and paused waiting for an equally enthused Victor to smile back, and when that didn't happen Mr. Van Dort cleared his throat and carried on, " You know, fishing isn't very different from say…" Victor can tell his father is trying hard to think of something as he twiddles a lavish hook in one hand, "…than drawing, my boy!" Shifting a bit in his seat, Victor watched as the world changed from buildings to trees and the whole time his father tried explaining fishing and drawing. As the carriage slowed to a halt, Mr. Van Dort finished lamely with, "um, and so you see, we um, we have fish logos on our advertisements… which are hand drawn!" he seemed proud of this deduction, "There you have it: fishing, drawing drawing, fishing. They're one in the same." Smiling meekly he then shoved a too large life vest over his son.

Taking a step from the confines of the carriage Victor met a harsh wind and looked around at the over fished lake, and in fact the whole location leaves something to be desired. Looking into the gray waters Victor felt ill, but picked up a stick and hurled it as far as he could into the murky lake. It went quite a ways and yet landed vertically in the mud which left Victor to wonder what kind of sick joke the life vest was.

Mr. Van Dort, who seemed to have missed the great hurl dropped the fishing gear, and taking a hearty breath said, "Would you look at that, Victor, it's quite magnificent if I say so myself." Taking a few more deep breathes as to arouse some majesty in the moment, but in the end only needed a sit down. "Yep, one day this will be yours to continue reaping the bounty from!" Victor had no idea what 'bounty' his father was talking about, but tried his best to smile. "Well, enough of that" Mr. Van Dort had gotten back up to set up the gear while Victor periodically lifted his sinking shoes from the mud. By the time the gear was set up, Victor couldn't help but notice that the mud had entirely engulfed one supply box. Mr. Van Dort noticed it as well and started lifting each item in turn as not to let it sink, and when the cycle was complete it was time to start it again. As the light entertainment continued, Victor could hear laughter from the carriage that hastily turned to coughing. Victor's attention turned back to the fishing gear and realized that the bait is beyond his father's clutch; the mud had won this round.

"Say, Victor, em, go and find some worms seeing as…" he scratched his head and must be referring to the mud's victory. So as not to let his father's pride suffer any further defeats from a wet, sticky, soft bit of earth Victor nodded and once again lifted his shoes up on the trudge to dryer land. Victor could still see his father sloppily tangoing with the mud and fishing poles from a small hill top. Victor could imagine that the hill was once a kingly mountain that suffered the mud's abuse and was reduced to what Victor now stands on. He can imagine early mountaineers risking their lives as they ventured up the mountain and boasting their trials at the town pub and then coming back with eager followers to witness only a hill and------

"Victor! What in the blazes are you doing? Stop lollygagging and find some worms."

Victor's eyes snapped back in focus and he blushed before turning on his heel to get out of his father's sight. Once down the other side of the hill and out of view, Victor relaxed and went back to abashed looks on his made up mountaineer's faces. As he continued on he noticed a little fenced off area and made his way over, nearing the fence he discovered a variety of flowers and weeds in the patch. "A garden" he whispered and the first true smile he sported today appears on his face. The rusty gate creaked open and Victor sat in the flowers, some of which look a little worse for wear. Picking a petal from each type of flower, he pocketed them for later reference. Taking on a new love of the getaway garden, he started pulling weeds from the patch, although some of the well rooted weeds gave the poor, threadlike boy a full workout. When it cleared out there was nothing left to do but sit and enjoy the beauty…until he heard Mayhew coughing and knew it was a warning to the boy that his father wouldn't put up with Victor's absence much longer. Using a stick, Victor started digging the soft earth. After digging for many minutes and creating a large hole, there is no sign of worms. Giving a few last hopeful prods Victor plowed the stick in the dirt in frustration to which the dirt yelped back…which in turn sent Victor yelping until there was a yelping frenzy. Victor dropped the stick, his mouth hung open in horror, and pupils diminished to pin points, Victor rushed backward over the flowers he'd tried so hard to maintain, his backside now clumped with dirt. After a moment of relief and at a safe distance Victor awkwardly confronted the ground.

"Hellooo…?"

Victor thought he'd gone round the loop, but confirms it when the ground spits back, "What's the big idea?"

"Oh dear, dear me" Victor whispered and twisted his necktie.

"Don't mutter, I can't hear a thing like that." A moments pause and, "Well, come on then, don't just disrupt my feeding and then ignore me, come a little nearer, I won't bite you." a deranged laughter followed.

Inching his way in fear, Victor obeyed the ground and in a hollow voice asked, "Do excuse me, but what's going on?" The stick had been prodded back out of the earth.

"You almost killed me with that stick, just use your hands to clear away the dirt and I think you'll understand better."

Feeling idiotic, Victor continued to listen and gently brushed the dirt out of the way until, to further his terror, discovered a rotting bunny rabbit. "Oh dear dear _dear_ me. I am so _sooo_ terribly sorry for disrupting your, um, peace, dear Mr., erm, sir, rabbit." Victor is breaking into a cold sweat.

"I'm not the rabbit; the rabbits dead. I'm here, right here." Victor jerked his head to see a maggot squirm out of the rabbit's eye socket.

"Oh—oh of course." Victor says in a high, tight voice.

The maggot looked up at the pallid boy, "I think you need to calm down. Take a breath and loosen that necktie."

"Of course"

"You already said that."

"Of course…."

The maggot rolled his eyes and after many more episodes of 'of course' Victor finally got his head about the whole situation. "Right" Victor said, now on breathing terms and necktie loosened, "So, you've just always talked, then?"

"Yes, well I had to learn first, but yes."

"Ah," Victor decided to simply believe everything from here on out, "So I take it that this isn't a garden, then?"

"Nope, it's been a pet cemetery for as long as I can remember" the maggot continued, "nice selection of eats."

Victor recoiled, "Quite." Taking another breath, "I'm glad you live up here; the lake's mud beyond that hill is killer."

"So I've heard" the maggot crawled out of the rabbit further and closer to Victor. Victor smiled and laid down on his stomach to talk to the maggot in a better fashion. A new friendship, Victor thought, a new friend. The friend may or may not be real, and a maggot wasn't his first choice, but the boy wasn't choosey. He hadn't had a friend since Scrap's death only months before and when Victor thought about it, the possibilities seemed boundless----

"A little grim on you're choice, but nice work, Victor!" Mr. Van Dort had appeared out of thin air, covered in mud to his nose; he swapped the maggot from Victor's hands and in one fluid motion stuck the maggot on his hook. In the maggot's last few seconds it glared at Victor, "I guess this is the end of the line".

"….Oh. Oh dear."


End file.
